After knowing of Don Mamouney and seeing him from a distance since the second half of 1980s, I finally met and chatted with him at the Tangled Garden set at the Museum on the 19th and 20th of August 2007.

Other than chatting about the Tangled Garden and the prospects of future projects in Darwin involving Sidetrack Theatre and Komunitas (see other blog entry on The Tangled Garden), I was happy to chat with him about his views on locality and community cultural development.

In 2000, Don and I were commissioned by Christine Sammers of the Australia Council for the Arts to write essays presenting opposing viewpoints about locality and community cultural development: Don argued for privileging work in localities, or local communities, and I argued against privileging locality. So it was with some perverse pleasure that I told Don that I was now trying to pursue his viewpoint in my work with Brown's Mart (that is, our push into suburbs and neighbourhoods). Don was happy to hear that as he was still convinced that working locally was where community cultural development should be headed.

I admitted to Don that even back then I was not really completely against privileging locality as I did say in my essay that it is necessary in some circumstances to privilege locality. I said also that Darwin today demands the privileging of place.

My essay was published in Artwork but I'm not sure if Don's essay was published there, or at all -- he thinks that Australia Council did not publish it. I think I have a copy of the two essays; I'll dig them up and maybe publish them on BMCA's web site, with Don's permission, to ignite or reignite discourse on this matter.

It was good meeting Don Mamouney at last.